Here take back the stuff that I am, nature, knead it back into the dough of being, make of me a bush, a cloud, whatever you will, even a man, only no longer make me.

Great men too make mistakes, and many among them do it so often that one is almost tempted to call them little men.

Everyone should study at least enough philosophy and belles-lettres to make his sexual experience more delectable.

Many intelligent people, when about to write . . . , force on their minds a certain notion about style, just as they screw up their faces when they sit for their portraits.

Much reading has brought upon us a learned barbarism.

A person reveals his character by nothing so clearly as the joke he resents.

With a pen in my hand I have successfully stormed bulwarks from which others armed with sword and excommunication have been repulsed.